John Aubrey on "the hands of mistaken zeal"

Following up on a lead in Paul Cartledge's 1975 essay on the Spartan
Revolution (*Arethusa*) I came upon this quote from John Aubrey's
researches in northern Wiltshire
<https://nam04.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gutenberg.org%2Fcache%2Fepub%2F4254%2Fpg4254-images.html&amp;data=02%7C01%7CCLASSICS-L%40lsv.uky.edu%7C45a38b8dff7d4a559f4d08d6fd7003cf%7C2b30530b69b64457b818481cb53d42ae%7C0%7C0%7C636975054876951805&amp;sdata=MarLbm7l50j4Sc0ZP0Rs3ZZfHJPynVavroQGO7tmQVg%3D&amp;reserved=0>.  I don't
know if the reference to "mistaken zeal" has figured in any recent studies
of damage to archaeological finds, but it might be useful in some way.

Best,

Dan

...

But as Pythagoras did guess at the vastness of Hercules' stature by the
length of his foot, so among these ruins are remains enough left for a man
to give a guess what noble buildings, &c. were made by the piety, charity,
and magnanimity of our forefathers.


And as in prospects, we are there pleased most where something keeps the
eye from being lost, and leaves us room to guess; so here the eye and mind
is no less affected with these stately ruins, than they would have been
when standing and entire. They breed in generous minds a kind of pity, and
sets the thoughts a-work to make out their magnifice as they were taken in
perfection. These remains are *tanquam Tabulata Naufragii*, that after the
revolution of so many years and governments, have escaped the teeth of
Time, and (*which is more dangerous) the hands of mistaken Zeal*. So that
the retrieving of these forgotten things from oblivion, in some sort
resembles that of a conjurer, who make those walk and appear that have lain
in their graves many hundreds of years, and to represent, as it were to the
eye, the places, customs, and fashions that were of old time.

Let us imagine then what kind of country this was in the time of the
ancient Britains....